Foothill Dialogue/Inner SGV cities compared

Some reader comments and my responses. Feel free to add your two cents though I can't promise a response:

Kimberleigh:

What I would support is an extension from the present terminal at Sierra Madre Villa Station along the Foothill corridor to just past Duarte, then a southward turn to the Covina Metrolink station.

That would make the Gold Line useful, because it would connect the Metrolink service from the Inland Empire to the service which operates significantly farther north than Metrolink does. People who live in the Inland Empire with jobs in the northern San Gabriel Valley would then have a good excuse to stop driving.

Add a Los Angeles World Airports shuttle from the Ontario Metrolink station to the airport, and you have the connection that people would be inclined to actually use to get there.

VERY intriguing idea! I like the way you think.

Morgan:

Irwin has suggested the alternative of building a subway under Valley Boulevard. [scroll down] Personally I'm not sold at present, but it's a well thought out idea that deserves to be considered further. My take:

Valley Boulevard is a busy commercial corridor with increasing density. But is it an urban center? I perceive Valley Boulevard in relation to Main/Las Tunas as I do Washington Boulevard in relation to Colorado Avenue in Pasadena. Valley Boulevard is dense and commercial but it is not a “downtown” street. As Irwin wrote, “The stretch of the street from Alhambra to Rosemead is jammed packed with major shopping centers and eateries that would be perfect for foot traffic - if only there is a way to get there by efficient transit” [my emphasis]. But downtown Alhambra is already a thriving pedestrian environment in spite of its lack of efficient transit. Why establish new centers to compete with what few successful walkable urban environments we have? We need to build upon our strengths and traditions. I’m sure it would be no time until pedestrian traffic takes firmer root along Valley Boulevard, but for the time being we need to build upon our strengths.

As far as the importance of businesses along Valley and Garvey, the question is, do any of the stops along the way justify the placement of a valuable regional connection or would they benefit just as much from a robust local network connecting to two nearby regional station: in downtown Alhambra and at the new Monterey Park Busway station? I’m not convinced a Valley subway alignment is the best option. However, you provide a lot of food for thought, so I’m still keeping an open mind.

I have conceived the El Monte Busway as a “mini-Metrolink” line devoted almost exclusively to serving the Eastern San Gabriel Valley, bypassing the inner suburbs on its way to and from Downtown. Because it is shorter in length and has greater flexibility than Metrolink trains, the Busway could run later and with greater frequency than Metrolink, thereby giving Outer Valley residents greater travel flexibility. I would also add a stop at Atlantic as an access station to and from the inner suburbs. But for this "mini-Metrolink" to succeed and carry the levels of traffic to sustain the route, all regional traffic to and from the Outer Valley needs to travel through this corridor.

"[L]et’s not forget the 15 universities and colleges that would be connected along the route, or City of Hope, a leading biomedical research and treatment center and hospital." Would you deny a connection for the Claremont Colleges to the hustle and bustle of LA?"

The fact is, these connections and many more already exist. Unfortunately, they are tenuous connections. These neglected local transit networks should be drastically upgraded rather than undermined by ill conceived regional infrastructure. The Foothill extension would basically charge blindly into this nascent network and impose its own extreme northern orientation upon it, forcing Metro and Foothill Transit to reorient the established transit network to serve this Johnny-Come-Lately line. The Foothill Line would be an intrusion, not an enhancement.

Jeremy:

the foothill extension will not contribute to more sprawl. it will be a densifing force to the easter SGV. adding larger develeompents to cities known for single family houseing and no commercial hubs. the foothill line would change that, allowing cities to adjust there zoning to allow for higher profile constructions. encouraging more train trips over long driving commutes.

As I have said before, densification without centralization will fail. You are correct in saying the Foothill is intended to create density, but that is precisely why it should be opposed. Azusa is a nice place with a lovely (north-south oriented, I might point out) central commercial corridor, but it is a completely inappropriate setting for clusters of high density development. Such development will create tiny islands of density linked to Downtown LA and one another by a weak transit strand and to everything else by automobile. That’s not a lot of transit in what is supposed to be transit-oriented development. Furthermore, those islands of density lie well outside th San Gabriel Valley's center of gravity, to say nothing of the greater metropolitan area's center of gravity. Densification out there would only exacerbate metropolitan decentralization and squander our increasingly precious resources.

encouraging sprawl would be making a foothill extension to lancaster were open land is prolific.

This reminded me of the old observation about how if you ask a suburban home owner where sprawl begins, he or she will point to the house completed just after theirs.

Garrett:


Alhambra!?! Is that supposed to be a joke? I can't think of anything there at the top of my head that I would want to go there for...

People were probably saying the same thing about Pasadena 15 years ago. Also consider that the five cities of Alhambra, San Gabriel, Monterey Park, Rosemead, and Temple City have a combined population over twice as large as Pasadena's, while covering a land area only 5 square miles larger. If these five cities consolidated politically, the new city would be the third largest in LA county after Long Beach and before Glendale. Meanwhile, the four cities of Sierra Madre, Arcadia, Monrovia, and Duarte have a combined population slightly less than Pasadena's while covering 50% more land.



NOTE: The Wiki figures are off for Monterey Park, with 2005 population count and 2000 population density.

Finally, one last thing. The Foothill debate needs to get away from focusing exclusively on alleviating car traffic on the 210. The 210 is merely a conduit and is not the problem. The problem is all the cars trying to squeeze through that conduit. We could widen and extend the freeway, maybe build a train to open up more space on it, but none of those options address the fundamental fact that our geographical reach now exceeds our economic grasp. No single freeway expansion or light-rail line to infinity is going to provide a magic bullet. We've been digging this hole a long time, it's going to take just as long to claw our way out.